"You've already become a Tier 3 High Phantom Beast Knight?" Cousin Mel asked in surprise within the independent Small Castle.
"Yes." Russell replied calmly. "It wasn't that difficult."
"Not difficult?" Mel cried out. "Mora and I still haven't achieved Perfect Synchronization!"
Mora was his contracted Phantom Beast—an Iron Feather Grey Crane.
After speaking, Mel sighed in dejection and admiration. "No wonder everyone thinks that if the Shadowflame Dragon chooses a knight, you'll definitely be the first choice... Now that Frost Trolls and Snow Giants are attacking from all sides, perhaps one day the dragon will choose you as its knight."
"That's unlikely." Russell shook his head.
From his face-to-face exchange with the Shadowflame Dragon, he could tell that even if the Shadowflame Dragon chose to sacrifice itself and leave behind only the remnants of a volcano, it had never considered choosing him as its knight.
The dragon's pride was plain to see.
Fortunately, Russell did not crave a dragon all that much. After all, he already had a Dream Dragon of his own.
"Enough of that. Cheers, Cousin."
"Cheers."
The two cousins chatted casually.
Mel did most of the talking, sometimes dreaming of the policies he would implement after becoming Grand Duke, sometimes hoping for the blissful future of marrying Annie Xuanfuhua.
At that moment, Unicorn Polly, who was taking a walk across the Small Castle's lawn, suddenly spoke in his mind. "Russell, come out and look! Such a beautiful meteor shower just streaked across the horizon."
Russell's brows rose, and he dashed out of the dining hall like lightning, arriving outside the castle in an instant.
The western sky was pitch-black, and the meteor shower had not entirely faded. Every so often, one or two stray meteors would tear through the night, bloom with light, and fall toward unknown